Understanding Microevolution and Macroevolution

By Katie Hulse

Many consider evolution to be a fact. Theodosius Dobzhansky even asserted that “Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.”¹ It’s important to note, though, that evolution can refer to several different things (e.g., change over time, universal common descent), so it’s best to be clear when discussing this topic. In this article, I’ll focus specifically on two types of evolution: microevolution (small-scale biological change) and macroevolution (large-scale biological change). I’ll compare these types of evolution, arguing that while microevolution is well-supported, macroevolution is not, and then I’ll discuss why this matters.

Microevolution

Let’s first focus on microevolution. Microevolution refers to limited, small-scale biological changes. It “encompasses single cell, single organism, and species-level population changes.”² This type of evolution is well established. 

Perhaps you’re familiar with the textbook example of Darwin’s Galapagos finches. These finches exhibit variations in beak size and shape in response to differences in the environment and availability of food sources. This is an example of variation within a species that allowed that species to adapt to environmental change. It’s a microevolutionary change.

Microevolution can be considered a reflection of God’s good design, allowing organisms to survive by adapting or responding to environmental changes. Without this, species would be much more susceptible to extinction. 

Macroevolution

Let’s move on to macroevolution. Macroevolution refers to large-scale biological changes that, over time, result in the formation of new animal plans and new organisms. In the macroevolutionary view, organisms share a common ancestor. Scientists often extrapolate from microevolution to macroevolution, arguing that given enough time, such small-scale changes can lead to much larger biological changes. However, there are some challenges to this idea. 

New Biological Information

According to macroevolution, we would expect to see the fossil record demonstrating a pattern of novel body plans arising gradually from transitional intermediate forms. However, in the Cambrian fossil record, organisms appear suddenly and fully formed. Charles Darwin acknowledged that the fossil record presented a major problem for his theory of the gradual evolution of species. Recent evidence has not resolved this issue.  

Furthermore, macroevolutionary changes like the assembly of new body plans require new biological information, which philosopher of science Stephen Meyer argues is the main problem with neo-Darwinism. No mechanism would lead to new biological information and, in turn, new body plans and life forms such as we see in the Cambrian explosion. 

According to neo-Darwinism, the origin of novel biological forms can be explained by natural selection acting on genetic mutations. Random mutations in the DNA are thought to produce new genetic information. But if mutations are random, the likelihood of the mutation and natural selection generating a new gene or protein is very small. Meyer states, “For even the smallest unit of functional innovation—a novel protein—to arise, many improbable rearrangements of nucleotide bases would need to occur before natural selection had anything new and advantageous to select.”³ Molecular biologist Robert Sauer’s research confirmed that functional proteins are indeed rare in sequence space.⁴ 

In examining neo-Darwinism’s ability to produce novel life forms, Douglas Axe focused on the origin of new protein folds. For new life forms to arise, new proteins also must have arisen (since new organisms tend to have new cell types, and new proteins are often required for new cell types). And new proteins that are able to perform new functions often require new folds in order to perform those new functions. So when we see the considerable number of new life forms in the Cambrian fossil record, there must have also been bursts of new protein folds.⁵ Yet Axe’s results demonstrated that folded, functional amino-acid sequences are highly rare in sequence space.⁶ 

With our knowledge of the DNA structure and a single gene containing hundreds or thousands of nucleotide bases in precise sequences, evolutionary biologists came to understand that single mutations, which are often deleterious or degrading, are unlikely to generate new advantageous traits.⁷ Some scientists have thus explored the likelihood of multiple coordinated mutations producing new genes and proteins. However, evolutionary biologist John Maynard Smith, who researched this, found that multiple coordinated mutations are very improbable and likely don’t play a significant role in the production of novel structures.⁸

Another factor involving the origin of body plans is embryological development. During embryological development, proteins are arranged such that they play a role in distinctive cell types, and these distinctive cell types are organized such that they form distinctive tissues, organs, and body plans. Only those mutations that occur early on in the development of organisms are likely to affect many cells and generate macroevolutionary changes like changes in body plans, because the body plan has largely been established by the late stages of development. But this is problematic because developmental biology has demonstrated that mutations affecting the formation of body plans early in development damage the organism (either crippling the organism or resulting in its death).⁹ 

Also, developmental gene regulatory networks, which control the embryological development of animals, pose a difficulty for neo-Darwinism. A developmental gene regulatory network refers to the integrated network of nonprotein-coding regions of DNA that regulate and control gene expression and the protein-coding regions of the genome. Biologist Eric Davidson researched embryological development and described developmental gene regulatory networks as directing the embryo’s “progressive increase in complexity.”¹⁰ Like regulatory genes, these regulatory networks cannot experience any change or mutation without resulting in catastrophic effects to the organism.¹¹

Even with the aid of human agency in controlled lab settings, experiments are demonstrating only small-scale changes. Astronomer Hugh Ross writes that “long-term evolution experiments performed in real time show that even with the aid of extreme laboratory manipulation in the most evolutionally flexible species—bacteria and yeast—nothing more than microevolutionary changes occur.”¹² 

Vestigial Organs

Another evidence supporting the idea that organisms have a shared ancestry is the existence of vestigial organs. Vestigial organs refer to homologous (similar) structures that evolutionists consider to have lost their original function over time through the process of evolution. In Darwin’s words, they are organs “bearing the stamp of inutility.”¹³ The appendix in humans is a common example. Pseudogenes are often considered to be molecular vestigial structures. However, many organs once thought to be vestigial have actually been found to have function and positively contribute to an organism’s fitness.¹⁴ The appendix in humans, for instance, stores beneficial microbes.¹⁵ Furthermore, scientists have discovered that all classes of pseudogenes have functional roles.¹⁶ The pseudogene Makorin-1-pl, for instance, plays a role in protecting the Makroin-1 mRNA from breaking down, and the pseudogene, Phosphoglycerate mutase, produces a functional protein.¹⁷ With the diminishing number of vestigial organs, these structures do not seem to serve as evidence for common ancestry.

Human Origins

We see certain challenges when we consider modern humans. Modern humans are unique when compared to other species. Archaeology shows a drastic difference when modern humans arrive on the scene (e.g., the radical emergence of new technology and advanced cultural practices, like art, music, and ornamentation), suggesting that humans are significantly different than hominids.¹⁸ Paleoanthropologist Ian Tattersall, who accepts the evolutionary view, acknowledges the immense leap in cognitive and behavioral abilities seen in modern humans when compared to hominids. In his own words, this is “a qualitative leap in cognitive state unparalleled in history.”¹⁹ He admits that “there is certainly no evidence to support the notion that we gradually became who we inherently are over an extended period, in either the physical or the intellectual sense.”²⁰ Evolution fails to account for the cognitive and behavioral differences between humans and hominids. In fact, he writes, “the only reason we have for believing that such a leap could ever have been made, is that it was made.”²¹ Tattersall takes it as fact that humans have arisen from the evolutionary process, yet he doesn’t understand how this has transpired. 

Furthermore, if a naturalistic evolutionary process is responsible for humanity’s origin, then it follows that everything about humans arises from this naturalistic process. The reliability of humanity’s cognitive abilities comes into question. As C. S. Lewis put it, “If minds are wholly dependent on brains, and brains on biochemistry, and biochemistry (in the long run) on the meaningless flux of atoms, I cannot understand how the thought of those minds should have any more significance than the sound of the wind in the trees.”²² We wouldn’t be able to trust what our senses, our thoughts, are telling us about the world. 

With such challenges to evolution, why do so many declare it a fact? Apologist Greg Koukl elucidates, “The answer you get is always the same: Because we’re here. It must have happened. That’s called circular reasoning…based on a prior commitment to naturalism that won’t be shaken by the facts. Which proves that this is not about science, it’s about philosophy.”²³ Naturalism drives much of the debate surrounding evolution.²⁴ 

Why Are There Similarities?

Why might there be biological similarities among species, then? One possibility is that a common design aids in our ability to learn about the biological realm. It allows for discoverability. What we learn about one organism might apply to other organisms. Biochemist Fazale Rana explains:

For example: by studying DNA replication in bacteria, we have gained key insight that allows us to understand DNA replication in all life on the planet. Studying gene regulation in yeast helps us understand gene regulation in human beings. Studying the developmental pathways of the nematode C. elegans has yielded important knowledge that helps us understand growth and development in many multicellular organisms. Studying genetics in the fruit fly Drosophila has provided key understanding regarding inheritance.²⁵

Without such biological similarities, scientific discovery and progress would be much more difficult. 

Why Does This Matter?

One reason this discussion of evolution is important concerns our origins as humans. How we view the origin of humanity ultimately affects how we view and treat human beings. In the evolutionary view, “Because chance governs biological evolution at its most fundamental level, repeated evolutionary events must result in dramatically different outcomes,” so “humanity might never have been.”²⁶ There is ultimately no significance to humanity—no meaning, no purpose, no value—according to the naturalistic evolutionary account of human origins. Society can also only function well if human life is valued; it would crumple if naturalistic conclusions regarding human life were commonly accepted. 

In contrast, Scripture portrays God as actively involved in the creation process (Genesis 1-2). God intentionally created humanity. More than this, he created us in his image, giving us inherent worth and dignity. 

We can see microevolution as part of God’s good design, allowing species to adapt and persist. In contrast to macroevolution, microevolution is not controversial. Macroevolution, on the other hand, faces a number of challenges.  

Notes

1. Theodosius Dobzhansky, “Nothing in Biology Makes Sense Except in the Light of Evolution,” The American Biology Teacher 35, no. 3 (March 1973).
2. Anjeanette Roberts, “Is Microevolution a Fact?” in Anjeanette Roberts, Fazale Rana, Sue Dykes, and Mark Perez, Thinking About Evolution: 25 Questions Christians Want Answered (RTB Press, 2020), 88.
3. Stephen C. Meyer, Darwin’s Doubt: The Explosive Origin of Animal Life and the Case for Intelligent Design (HarperCollins, 2013), 177.
4. Sauer and his colleagues found an estimated ratio of functional to non-functional amino-acid sequences to be about 1 to 10⁶³ for a short protein of 92 amino acids in length. Meyer, Darwin’s Doubt, 180.
5. Meyer, Darwin’s Doubt, 191.
6. Axe found that the chance of a mutation producing a specific functional protein among the possibility of 150 amino acid sequences is 1 in 10⁷⁷, or one in one hundred thousand, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion. Meyer, Darwin’s Doubt, 200.
7. Evolutionary biologists often invoke mutation-generating mechanisms like exon shuffling and gene duplication to account for the origin of new genetic information. However, one issue with these explanations is that all these mechanisms, except de novo generation, start with preexisting genes or large sections of genetic text, so they assume preexisting sources of biological information. The de novo origination of new genes does not presuppose existing genetic information, but evolutionary biologists usually appeal to de novo origination when there is an unexplained increase in genetic information. It doesn’t refer to any known process. In other words, de novo origination does not explain how new genes arose. Many of these mutation-generating scenarios also don’t attempt to explain the origin of new protein folds. Meyer, Darwin’s Doubt, 217-223.
8. Meyer, Darwin’s Doubt, 239. More recently, biochemist Michael Behe and physicist David Snoke explored the likelihood that multiple point mutations occur simultaneously to produce a new gene or protein that is able to be selected. They conclude, “generally the probability of multiple mutations arising in close (functionally relevant) coordination to each other was ‘prohibitively’ low—it would likely take an immensely long time, typically far longer than the age of the earth.” Meyer, Darwin’s Doubt, 242. Behe and Snoke found that for only two coordinated mutations, either a huge population size (exceeding the number of multicellular organisms that have ever lived) or an immensely long waiting time (exceeding the duration of life on earth) would be required by neo-Darwinism’s mechanism of mutation and natural selection. Michael Behe and David Snoke, “Simulating Evolution by Gene Duplication of Protein Features that Require Multiple Amino Acid Residues,” Protein Science 13 (2004): 2651-64.
9. Meyer, Darwin’s Doubt, 259-260.
10. Eric Davidson, The Regulatory Genome: Gene Regulatory Networks in Development and Evolution (New York: Academic, 2001): 116, as cited in Meyer, Darwin’s Doubt, 268.
11. Meyer, Darwin’s Doubt, 270.
12. Hugh Ross, Improbable Planet: How Earth Became Humanity’s Home (Baker Books, 2016), 190.
13. Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species (Harvard University, 1964), 450.
14. Cornelius Hunter, Darwin’s God: Evolution and the Problem of Evil (Brazos, 2001), 32.
15. Fazale Rana, “The Human Appendix: What Is It Good For?,” Reasons to Believe, October 1, 2008, accessed July 7, 2025, https://reasons.org/explore/publications/connections/read/connections/2008/10/01/the-human-appendix-what-is-it-good-for.   
16. Fazale Rana with Hugh Ross, Who Was Adam? A Creation Model Approach to the Origin of Humanity (Covina, CA: RTB Press, 2015), 344-348.
17. Rana with Ross, Who Was Adam?, 241-242.
18. Rana with Ross, Who Was Adam?, 95-99.
19. Ian Tattersall, Masters of the Planet: The Search for Our Human Origins (St. Martin’s, 2012), 199
20. Tattersall, Masters of the Planet, 207.
21. Tattersall, Masters of the Planet, 199.
22. C. S. Lewis, “Is Theology Poetry?” in The Weight of Glory (New York: Harper Collins, 1976), 139. 
23. Gregory Koukl, “Evolution Is Philosophy, Not Science,” Stand to Reason, April 22, 2013, accessed June 30, 2025, https://www.str.org/w/evolution-is-philosophy-not-science. 
24. See my article “Are Science and Christianity Related?,” Women in Apologetics, May 3, 2024, https://womeninapologetics.com/are-science-and-christianity-related/.
25. Fazale Rana, “Q&A: Why Would an Infinite Creator Employ the Same Designs?,” Reasons to Believe, December 21, 2016, accessed June 24, 2025, https://reasons.org/explore/blogs/the-cells-design/q-a-why-would-an-infinite-creator-employ-the-same-designs.  
26. Rana with Ross, Who Was Adam?, 25.